Smart Home Electrics

Every now and then, Solstice gets a chance to do something huge – and when we say huge, we mean high-end, state of the art, latest-and-greatest . . . the best of the best.

In the spring of 2009, Solstice Enterprises began the mother of all home-theater projects.  One of Solstice’s most valued customers (and a major figure and coinsurer in the Audio-Visual Industry) envisioned the ultimate home-theater – it was to be technically superior, and completely sensitive to the historical nature of his 1876 Victorian in the Fillmore.  There’s no sign of the gem in the basement from outside the residence.            

Fourteen feet of excavation was done by Derry/ Casey Construction in the rainy months of March – a special props to the boys who removed several tons of dirt by the wheel-barrel load. 

This theater features 32 speakers, a 12 foot-wide screen with anthro-pomorphic format, fiber-optic star-field lighting in the ceiling by I-sky, with red, blue, and green color changing.  There are 11 seats with the opportunity for a third row overflow.  Over 200 low voltage drops converge in three massive panels beneath the spiral stair case. 

“It’s been a pleasure and an honor,” said Solstice CEO Laurence Sweeny, “to work with some of the top people in their fields on this project.”  Larry gave props to Charles Salter Associates (cmsalter.com) for his help in tuning the theater. 

Further aiding the sound quality (and keeping it quiet for the neighbors) are the 10 inches of poured concrete followed by a resilience channel air-gap.  Then it was three layers of 5/8^th sheetrock, followed by four inches of sound-deadening foam, with appropriate diffusers, absorbers, and deflectors.  We are talking about some acoustic muscle!

(Stay tuned . . . Pictures are coming soon!)

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This project has been a chance for the Solstice boys to flex their muscles, but you don’t need to excavate and have 32 speakers for an awesome home theater experience.  Solstice has worked on quite possibly every size and type of entertainment system, and we can help find what’s right for you.

This summer, Solstice installed 30 landscaping lights on a 14 acre property in beautiful Sonoma county.  We created an inner perimeter around the pool, with another perimeter around the outer-grounds.  

The Jedi master on this one was Daemon Knutson, Solstice’s mean green-energy machine.  He crunched the numbers for the two shinny transformers that would juice the 30 lights. 

Fortunately, Sonoma was a crisp 100 degrees and sunny durring the project – but a strong, fresh westerly wind came up like clock-work every afternoon (so we’re not complaining).  The trenches were at least six inches deep, ensuring our direct-burial line would not interfere with future landscaping (or an aggressive Easter-egg hunt). 

We dug, dug, dug, ran close to a mile of wire, striped, spliced, connected, fastened, water-proofed, re-buried, troubleshot, and turned on the juice.

The lights made perfect sense.  Their design (basically a lamp on a pole) was subtle and unobtrusive, barely perceptible to the eye once installed, so that the final product did not visually intrude on the natural landscape.  And when they’re live, the lights cast a perfect beam on selected foliage, and quietly trace the perimeter of the property, adding both practical safety, and aesthetic.                      

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Do you have any landscaping that could use an accent?

Solstice Electric associate Todd D’Amario recently returned after a hiatus spent focusing on his other trade – art direction and scale model building for film and video. Check out his most recent work in Terminator 4, when the big explosions start coming!

Solstice Electric, the Bay Area’s premium provider of commercial and residential electrical services has launched www.SmartHomeElectrics.com, a site devoted to profiling the latest in Audio/Video, Lighting, Telecomunications, and home control technologies.

www.SmartHomeElectrics.com is slated to feature photos and behind-the-scenes descriptions of the latest and greatest in home technology installs, a “how-to” video series aimed at demystifying common electrical tasks for the average homeowner, and a question and answer forum.

Says Solstice President, Lawrence Sweeny, “We spent a long time researching the best platform for this site, and are very excited to have finally settled on Wordpress, a feature-rich Content Management Tool. With it’s underlying SQL database technology, it will definitely be able to scale up seamlessly as our site grows.”

Check out www.SmartHomeElectrics.com for more information.

Solstice Electric has recently launched a series of Do-It-Yourself instructional videos designed to help educate the average John and Jane Doe about common home technologies. Check it out here.

To all the mothers out there – hope your kids appreciate you!